Teardrops in a Muddy Puddle
by Waiting To Be Inspired
Summary: Rosto breaks Beka's heart, Tunstall leaves and travells across the world to find him while Goodwin and Tansy try to help Beka through her pain. Spoilers for Terrier
1. Yesterday's Tommorow

**Author's Note: I'm not at all sure if this will be any good or not, but the idea came into my mind and I just started writing. Don't get me wrong, I love Rosot and totally think he and Beka should get together, but I wanted to write this. Flames totally accepted (not that I could really stop you, but whatever). I don't believe that this is at all realistic, but who cares? It was kind of fun to write.**

**Summary: Rosto breaks Beka's heart, Tunstall leaves and travells across the world to find him and Goodwin and Tansy try to help Beka through her pain.**

_Sometime Before My Watch, the Third of the Month_

I remember when I had told my Dogs about me and Rosto, Tunstall had said that if he (meaning Rosto) had ever hurt me, he would be sorry. I had assured him that that would never happen, but I was wrong. So wrong…

٭٭

_I Suppose Before My Watch, Yesterday's Tomorrow_

I should never have trusted the Rogue. I should have known better, especially after what happened to my Ma. I had thought Rosto was different. I had thought we could make it work. I thought wrong.

٭٭

_After My Watch or Maybe Before… I Didn't Go_

I'm not going to my watch. I wouldn't be useful, I'd just be a liability. I suppose someone will come looking for me. I suppose I'd best get up and lock the door. I suppose I shouldn't have been as stupid as to let him take my heart like that.

٭٭

_Sometime Later…_

As I had just finished my last entry, Tunstall and Goodwin had burst through the door. I supposed that it was either during or after my watch.

"Where were you?" Goodwin had questioned me, her voice hard. "Why didn't you come to your watch?"

I didn't say anything, just shook my head.

"Answer me," Goodwin ordered.

I couldn't. I couldn't admit I'd been as foolish as to think it could work out between us.

My Dogs had been so kind to me, I hated not being able to at least give them some kind of an excuse. All of my emotions (love, hate, betrayal, guilt, remorse, confusion, the list could go ever on…) had been welling up inside of me and I finally just broke. The tears finally ran freely down my cheeks and my body was wracked by heaving sobs.

I couldn't see my Dogs, but I imagined that they were both standing there awkwardly, wondering if I had gone insane. Contrary to my thoughts, I felt a comforting hand on my shoulder and heard Goodwin murmuring soothing words to help me calm down.

When I had finished blubbering, Tunstall asked me, "What is wrong, Beka?"

I couldn't give a full explanation; I could only say one word, "Rosto."

"Rosto?" Asked Tunstall, "What did he do? He'll be sorry for whatever it is."

Despite my retched mood, I had to smile at that; Tunstall was like an older brother sometimes.

I didn't want to say any more, the details were too painful, so I just left them to Goodwin's assumption, "He broke her heart."

"I'll break him," growled Tunstall as he stalked out the door.


	2. I'm Not Here for Your Entertainment

**Author's Note: Thank you all who reviewed. I hadn't expected so many people to like** **this! Here is thje next chapter. Please** **review.**

**I'm not here for your Entertainment **

**I'm not here for your entertainment  
You don't really want to mess with me tonight  
Just stop and take a second  
I was fine before you walked into my life  
Cause you know it's over  
Before it began **

**-U + ** **UR**** Hand **

**Pink **

_After my Watch, the Fifth of the Month _

I will tell what happened when Rosto broke my heart, just to get it out.

_"Rosto," I pleaded. _

Yes, pleaded, I had pleaded. See this is not all my fault. He is just a dolt who cares for someone else. Not me, he doesn't care for me. He never cared for me. He cared for my stature with the law and my lord.

_"Rosto, just give me an explanation. Please," I was crying. _

Looking back, it was pitiful that I cried. "The cove that makes you cry isn't worth your tears and the cove that is worth your tears won't make you cry." Ma told me that. She should have followed her own advice. I should have followed her example and never trusted a rusher.

_He glared at me, "You don't deserve an explanation." _

Maybe that wasn't what happened. Maybe I'm telling the story where I am least at fault. Maybe I like that. Maybe I ought to stop. I think I shall.

I'll give a short explanation that I cannot twist in my favor: Rosto was seeing another mot behind my back and we got into a fight with me ending up slapping him and pushing him down the stairs.

Maybe I should regret doing that, but I don't. They power which it bestowed upon me is phenomenal; I do believe that I have conquered a bit of my accursed shyness. That would be a wonderful thing.

I want to get him back for all the pain he has caused me, but I fear I won't have to. When I went to my watch this evening, Tunstall wasn't there, it was just me and Goodwin.

Logically, I asked her were he was. She kept tight lipped on the matter. I pleaded and begged, but the best answer I could get out of her was that he was neither ill nor wounded.

Then an idea entered my mind and I ventured my next question unsure of whether or not I'd like the answer. "Did he go to find Rosto?"

After much pestering, Goodwin relented and told me, "Yes, he did go after Rosto."

"Well, he won't find him," I told her, "The coward ran away. This morning Aniki told me that he boarded a ship to the Yamani Islands. I'm not sure that I believe her. The mot he was seeing was from Scanra too so I think they went back there."

"You do?" Goodwin asked, looking around the dark alley in which they were walking, "I'll have to tell that to Tunstall when I see him again."

"He doesn't have to do that," I told Goodwin.

"Well, if he didn't, I would. 'Cause, Beka, I know what it's like to have your heart broken."

Now as I write this, I smile to think that I have such good friends.


	3. Overstating

**9.3.08 Sorry all for the long delay in the publishing of this chapter, I've lost it and rewritten it several times and here it finally is, I've tried to make it longer and deeper. And this is more the fact of some of my experiences than fiction so I hope this chapter seems more real. Please tell me what you think. And huge, **_**huge**_** thanks to my new beta, Lioness's Heart, you are awesome!**

**I would be overstating****  
****If I said I****  
****Knew you well****  
****Or that I knew you at all.****  
****-Beulah****  
****A Good Man is Easy To Kill**

**Chapter Three - Overstating**

Tansy calls what has come over me grief. I call it being. Whatever it is, it is an odd feeling.

This floating dream-state is unfamiliar to me. Pain I can deal with. Hate I can deal with. This? I don't understand it. I can't hear this feeling screamed from mot to cove. Can't see it in fierce glares. I can't know it.

I once heard a mot describe the grief of her son as being burned, you see your finger in the fire – know it's hot – and pull it out. Wait a second and the pain comes. She knew her son was dead before she realized her son was _dead_.

I'm stronger than that, though. I didn't care for Rosto. I didn't love his cream skin, his eyes like a cloudless winter night, his fair hair framing his face in gold. I hated the way he danced with his silver daggers. Hated the way he'd fight with his mind too. Loathed how he was never boring.

No, I do not miss him at all. I do not care what they say. You can't miss a gown you've never worn. I can't miss a love I've never known.

If I don't care, if I don't miss him, why can I not be free of this mundane fog? Why can I not return to my life as it was? Why can't I feel joy instead of a heavy dampness surrounding me and blocking everything out save for wretched thoughts of him?

I go through the motions of a day. I get up and dressed, eat some food, buy more food. Except now, everything I do is watched by Goodwin's or Tansy's sharp eyes and I'm ushered home and locked there before my watch. I have not the heart to escape.

I've said before that Tunstall's gone. He has taken a month's leave chasing down Rosto. He doesn't need to. I do not care for that wretched cove.

I opened by shutters last night and sat on the sill of my window to listen to the breath of the city.

Some minstrel played a tune. I sang brokenly along with the half remembered melody. The words I sang were not written for the song. They weren't even written. Just words dreamt by my mother and sung to me from the cradle.

The words told of a princess fair and pure. One day her knight rode up on his ivory steed and swept her away. Her knight was killed in a war and the princess learned that she was strong and independent and could live without any cove in her life, ordering her around. She took his battle charger and rode off to happiness.

My eyes, after singing the trembling words, were oddly damp. I've no notion why.

This morning as I slept the odd night's moments away, Goodwin burst into my room. Dimly I registered her pattern of footsteps weighted by something. Then sharply, I realized what weighted her down as she dumped the contents of a bucket over my head. I spluttered and wiped the water from my bleary eyes.

She watched me intently, hands on hips.

I muttered some unintelligible noise that could have been perceived as a question.

"This isn't healthy," she said, not unkindly. "This half denial. You need to get over him."

I glanced at my soaked bed and rose, grumbling, to air out the blankets.

"Admit it," Goodwin barked. "Puppy Cooper, do as I say and admit it."

"I was stupid," I allowed. "Dumb and naïve for thinking a dashing cove like him would even consider taking a plain mot like me."

"Oh, darling, no," Tansy came in my doorway, face wrinkled in concern and arms holding hot pastries.

I ignored her, "I know the type that will take me. The same type as gets thrown out to the gutter by the barkeep when they've drunk beyond too much. The type that would take me are all drunkards or looking for an insider in the Guard," I sniveled and wiped my nose on the handkerchief Tansy held toward me.

Goodwin watched me with hard eyes and spoke in a low, clear voice, "No. Cooper, I'll only say this once so listen good. This was not your fault. It was the fault of that crack-nobbed Scanran who needed three doxies on each arm."

"She's right," Tansy held a pastry out to me. "The blame should all lie on his shoulders."

"Then what is the weight I feel resting on mine?" I opened the shutters and let the pigeons fly in.

I was scattering corn for them when I heard the low female voice of Pinky's ghost, "I found him with her…him with her…with her…her. I lost it. That vegetable knife was heavy in my grip. But he stopped me … loved her … not me … stopped me. Turned the blade to my own heart … already broken. That –"

With a shriek I threw up my hands and chased the bird and her offending ghost away with the rest of the silly flock flapping behind. I'd _not_ end up like that mot. If I maybe did care the least bit, I get over it. And I suddenly had a plan.


End file.
